A fun comedy, but that's about it for me
The characters are fun to watch, and the cases are generally interesting. It's light enough to be a good palate cleanser after more emotionally heavy dramas and it's plotted out very episodically too, so it's good for if you don't have time or energy for binge watching.The supernatural element felt weird to me though, especially since they started out by saying there were no such thing as yao. I think the story would have been a lot stronger and more engaging if the supernatural elements had really all been trickery and powerful people believing in impossible things out of greed.
Also, while the supernatural abilities one of the characters exhibits are useful and even cool sometimes, I just could NOT take the weird cgi anthro-transformation seriously. Every time it happened it completely zeroed out all my investment and tension, which is not great considering they insisted on using it in really tense high-stakes scenes. Seriously you'll be watching along, having a great time, and then suddenly Ryan Ding's cool martial art scene will be replaced by a poorly cgi-ed furry flailing around and meowing incessantly.
Overall for me it was something light and funny to have on in the background, but I couldn't really get at all invested in it.
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The martial arts are cool. The three leads especially are SO COOL. THE MOST COOL. They are all cool the whole damn time. Fan Duobing is the youngest and least experienced, but like both the others he is literally introduced kicking ass and taking names. Li Lianhua spends 99.9% of the drama at 10% of his strength and is essentially still untouchable. If he decides a fight is worth getting serious he never fails and it is AWESOME. Die Feisheng's default setting appears to be Badass Motherfucker.the friendship is touching. The three leads especially but as you go through the series you slowly learn that there are other characters around who are deeply deeply loyal to the leads. Blind Liu is my favorite, he deserved more screen time.
The mysteries are fun. They may not make up a huge part of the series, but the process of who solves them and how gives you a lot of insight to various characters strengths, values, and methods. Plus it's really fun to watch the trio work together.
Li Xiangyi/Lianhua is the hero we don't deserve. Seriously, if someone needs saving the man saves them. If someone needs support he's right there when they need him. If he makes a promise he keeps it, even years and betrayals down the line. He talks a lot about his own flaws but he never acts on them. He cares so deeply about people and at every turn he does what he can to protect who he can.
I am in awe.
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A popcorn drama. Cute, light, and requiring absolutely nothing from the viewer.
It's a pretty easy watch overall, with a world so firmly of its genre and a plot so straightforward that I was able to put it down for weeks at a time, then pick it back up when I had time again without any confusion or difficulty.Truthfully the plot and world are pretty thin but this is one you watch for the romantic couple, not the plot.
The main leads are adorable together. Their relationship is sweet and fluffy like cotton candy. There are no love triangles, the only secondary love interest that pops up is a blatant comedic Jarjar Binks type character whose declarations of affection are an obvious gag.
Even the couples angsty moments don't come across very bitter. Throughout the entire drama they remain obvious about being absolutely head over heels for each other. And I don't mean obvious to just the viewers either, the supporting cast comments on how gone they are for each other constantly. Not always positively granted, but these two set off everyone else's love radar like a 7.0 earthquake.
One interesting thing I enjoyed about this drama was while the leads seemed pretty typical at first glance, they actually have a subtle gender role reversal thing going on.
Minor Spoilers below for what I mean, though they're mostly vague and about the tropes you can see in the characters.
The female lead has quite a few of the standard male lead tropes. She's the one who is more physically affectionate in their relationship and is often the one to initiate their intimate moments. At first you assume it's because she just doesn't understand the implication, but once she cottons on that physical intimacy is on the table she doesn't fluster or flail about being confused. She goes after her man. In once scene he's trying to chivalrously resist his desire for her and she not only pulls him back but literally says the words 'I want to have sex with you' . Then later on when we run into the conflict arc of the drama and the male leads reputation is in danger, she's the one who pulls the male leads typical 'I will give you up for the sake of your happiness while silently protecting you from the shadows' move.
Meanwhile the male lead starts off seeming like the cold and powerful type that softens because of the female leads bubbly nature. But once we get a few episodes in it turns out the guy is full of female lead romance tropes; he's struggling with (very light) harem drama at home, he's deeply attracted to his arranged marriage partner and mortified about it to the point of going to bed fully dressed and clutching quilts protectively against his chest, there's one scene where he can't stop his family from attacking the female lead and begs them to spare her. And then later when the female lead is having her 'distant but protective domineering CEO' arc he gets her to admit she loves him by playing 'damsel in distress'.
So yeah, they're completely playing into the tropes, just with a gender reversal which was actually a lot of fun to watch.
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A generally fluffy watch, with a pair of surprisingly tragic villains
I really liked this take on the switched identities trope. It was overall sweet and fun.The main couple is refreshingly sweet and earnest with each other, without the painful misunderstandings that these kind of plots usually come with. I liked them a lo.
But shockingly the emotional impact actually comes from the villain couple. The both of them were deeply morally grey. Often cruel to each other and to others, but at the same time seemed to sincerely care about each other in the end. They even had one or two moments where they used their villainy to protect people they viewed as helpless. Combine that with their incredibly tragic ending and they ended up delivering a surprising gut punch.
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frustrating male characters
If you're here for politics the female lead will probably carry you through. If you're here for the love story you're probably in for a rough ride.I was invested in all the characters and rooting for things to go well...right up until the leads met in their new life.
The male lead and his army make their re-entrance by plotting to murder everyone in the female leads home in order to keep their secret, then when she manages to outwit them immediately start talking about how wicked and twisted and suspicious she is. Because apparently a good person would have just laid down to die quietly.
Unfortunately things don't get better from there.
The Ding Army characters are brash, suspicious, and damn stupid. They're constantly charging headfirst into danger, trying to handle political intrigue and court maneuvering the same way they would a sword fight. The female lead then has to bail them out, usually against their will and while the lot of them hiss and mutter about how vicious and scheming she is.
According to the male leads subordinates, anything bad that happens to them must be the fault of the female lead. And I do mean anything, right down to the emperor disbanding their army (which he did because he got word that the male lead's subordinates had come back to the capital without orders) has got to be her direct fault. Nevermind all the effort she's put into hauling their asses out of the fire, including the time she had to lock them in a coal shed to prevent them storming the imperial prison.
A friend of mine said it's because they have trust issues over their commander being betrayed by his emperor, but the female lead has done nothing but try to help them. Yes her family is working against them, but they know from their own information network she's at odds with her family AND she helped them at great risk to herself before her family ever started making trouble for the ding army.
Honestly I dropped this because by episode 10 all I wanted was for the female lead to wash her hands of the whole ungrateful lot of them, but I know she won't.
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Pretty graphically violent, but good for web novel enthusiasts who like revenge plots.
When I say this one is violent, I mean VIOLENT. The introduction is extremely dark right off the bat, and there are unsettling scenes scattered throughout the drama afterwards.Of course it's not uncommon for a drama to have many supporting and minor characters killed off in a high stakes plot, but this drama tends toward some pretty graphic and brutal ones. I don't generally mind violence, but there were a few times with this one where I had to stop and go do something else for a few days.
(minor spoiler; one character is fed to starving dogs while still alive and another is essentially SA-ed to death)
It's much more in line with the pace and tropes of a web novel than your standard drama adaptation. It tends toward an extended build-up of tension before you get any kind of catharsis. For revenge stories that means that the antagonists are low on iq and high on power while the female lead is somehow always both the underdog and untouchable (unless the male lead is there, in which case she is of course outmatched).
The logic can get a little crazy straw from time to time. There's one scene where one of the minor villain girls gets caught in bed someone else's fiancé and they very nearly manage to somehow pin the fault of it on the female lead.
Essentially if over plot armor (for villains or leads) doesn't bother you, you'll be good but if it does you'll end up very frustrated before you make it even half way.
Honestly though, the thing that frustrated me the most was the main character.
Putting aside the Clark Kent premise, where a woman who was apparently the widely renowned wife of a high profile official can apparently come back to town with just a name change, and no one seriously challenges her identity, I found I couldn't really enjoy Xue Fangfei's character because of Jiang Li.
Xue Fangfei's intentions toward her may be good, but in the end she uses her after her death just as much as her stepmother did in life. Even with the scenes of her smiling ghost, I still felt like her kindness ended up being repaid with an erased existence and an unmarked grave.
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Sweet and playful without the heavy angst (extremely high rewatch value oh my god)
It's very fast paced, sometimes to the point of the various incarnation arcs feeling a bit rushed. I think it probably needed a few more episodes but as is it means you don't linger too long in angst or heartbreak which keeps the tone up.There is also a slapstick comedy aspect to it that I found it a little hard to get past at first. However, that slapstick element is mostly confined to the first third to half of each arc. As you move into the climax and later half of each one it transitions from cartoonish comedy to just the leads being playful and silly with each other.
The actors also have good chemistry.
I've heard some people say that the female lead wasn't as good as the male lead, and I'll concede that her acting in her tragic or melancholy scenes wasn't as impactful. But on the other hand she's really good at the playful, vivacious scenes and those are a lot more common in this drama. When the two leads are being silly and in love together they are a pure joy to watch.
Finally I thought their villain was very solid. Well written, with consistent motivations, a steady escalation pattern that convinces you he's a serious threat to more than just the leads, and a touch of humanity that made you sympathize with the characters who cared about him without ever making you feel bad for the villain himself.
Overall I didn't expect to like it as much as I did, but I really want to rewatch it again.
Edit: OH MY GOD REWATCH IT, YOU MUST REWATCH IT, IT REFRAMES THE WHOLE SEQUENCE OF EVENTS OH MY GOD I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS, IT'S SO SUBTLE BUT SO GOOD?!?!
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